Thursday, June 30, 2011

Tell Congress to oppose S. 978, the new "Ten Strikes" bill

Wanna Watch Starcraft 2? Wanna watch a Raid in Firelands? Wanna make your own pvp clips and post them on youtube? Well it might soon be illegal to do so.

Here they go again: The big business lobbyists who are behind the Internet Blacklist Bill are already making the sequel. THIS WEEK Senators will be voting on a "Ten Strikes" bill to make it a felony to stream copyrighted content -- like music in the background of a Youtube video -- more than ten times.
As the writers at TechDirt point out, under this bill you could go to jail for posting video of your friends singing karaoke:

The entertainment industry is freaking out about sites that embed and stream infringing content, and want law enforcement to put people in jail over it, rather than filing civil lawsuits.... We already pointed to one possibility: that people embedding YouTube videos could face five years in jail. Now, others are pointing out that it could also put kids who lip sync to popular songs, and post the resulting videos on YouTube, in jail as well.

That's right: Ten strikes and you could get jail time. Less than two weeks ago, the Hollywood industry magazine, Variety, reported, "Industry lobbyists pressed House members on Wednesday to pass legislation that would make illegal streaming of movies, TV shows and other types of content a felony...."
Only days later, the MPAA is getting its wish. Will you email your lawmakers and tell them to vote against the Ten Strikes Bill? Just add your info at right to automatically send this note to them, under your name and from your address. (You can edit the letter if you'd like to.)
Click here to read TechDirt's take on the bill. The bill's text is here.

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